


Love On Hold

by BleuSarcelle



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bittersweet, I really idk how to tag this, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-12
Updated: 2018-10-12
Packaged: 2019-07-30 00:19:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16275335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BleuSarcelle/pseuds/BleuSarcelle
Summary: Anger comes last, somewhere after the sun sets. But it’s quiet. It’s the kind of anger where it burns from the inside. The one where you can’t move because moving means tilting the crumbling weight on your shoulders.The fire inside Keith melts him but it’s painless. He can’t feel it. But Lance can. Lance can see it.Lance aches for the fire that cries for its soulmate.





	Love On Hold

**Author's Note:**

> eeeeeeer, I have nothing to say really? HAHAH, I am not sad but I'm in a weird mood and this happened and it's friday and I don't wanna woooooooork.
> 
> Pls excuse the grammar and typos, didn't give it much thought :3

Understanding comes to him in the span of a day.

 

At first, Lance is confused.

 

Lance’s next to a guy, someone he has never met. He doesn't see him. Or hear him. Touch is out of the question.

 

And yet, Lance can't step away from him. It's as if something keeps him close to this guy.

 

This guy with the bitch face and annoyed frown. This guy with long hair and eyes that hide behind dark bangs.

 

Lance follows him around, because he has no choice. He tries to make him trip one time, just in hopes to see if Lance actually has control over _something_. He doesn’t know if to be either upset or relieved when it doesn’t work.

 

Lance was never good at being mean.

 

Later, Lance is sad.

 

Because he realizes the reason on why he’s being ignored. Death is not what he expected. No religion ever practiced said anything about being a bodiless shape of the human he once was after life.

 

No religion ever mentioned being glued to a guy 24/7 neither.

 

Death is weird. And Lance doesn't handle well being ignored.

 

Then, hours later, Lance is angry.

 

He doesn't want to be here. Next to this guy. He wants to go back. He wants his family. His life.

 

And he cries and shouts to deaf ears because he _can't_.

 

Lance’s stuck. He resigns himself.

 

But then, Lance pays attention.

 

Because he doesn’t have anything better to do.

 

Quite literally.

 

That’s when things start to take shape. He learns the guy’s name. He starts seeing what he had been ignoring. It’s irony in its finest.

 

Lance sees the confusion in Keith’s steps. Hesitant and unsure of every single one of them. Like he doesn’t know these streets. As if he doesn’t know this city.

 

And yet he keeps moving. He moves forward while staying on his lane and trying to make himself invisible. But at the same time he is loud. He _is_ visible.

 

It’s the fire inside him. Raging with power but keeping itself small.

 

It the type of fire that warms. The one that cures and gives hope for another day.

 

Keith leaves a small flame behind every time. With the soft ‘thank you’ to the barista, to every small smile when kids bump him by accident. With every stray dog that seek love and Keith kneels down to provide what he can.

 

Confusion is still there, lingering, but so is kindness.

 

Then later, Keith’s sad. It’s in his eyes as they keep looking around him like a man on a mission. They scan every corner and every person. They get sadder as the hours pass by.

 

Searching, hoping.

 

His flame stays. But it flickers. It worries Lance.

 

Anger comes last, somewhere after the sun sets.

 

But it’s quiet. It’s the kind of anger where it burns from the inside. The one where you can’t move because moving means tilting the crumbling weight on your shoulders.

 

The fire inside Keith melts him but it’s painless. He can’t feel it.

 

But Lance can. Lance can see it.

 

Lance aches for the fire that cries for its soulmate.

 

And in the end, Keith crumbles. Knees hit the sand softly and hides his face in his lap.

 

Keith’s anger comes in tears. Because he can’t find what he’s looking for.

 

And Lance understands. Lance knows what he’s looking for.

 

Lance’s grief and sorrow claw deep into his chest. Deep into where his own fire lingers, flickering as it mourns for the soul he never got to hold.

 

Lance’s understanding comes with the coldest breeze.

 

But Keith’s comfort comes in waves.

 

It’s Lance who calls for them. To soothe the open wound in his soulmate's chest in ways he can’t. To soothe his bleeding heart and comfort him in ways he never got the chance to.

 

 _“I’m sorry,”_ Lance mumbles, soft and quietly. The sound of his once beating heart echoes around him. It takes him a moment to realize it’s not his own but Keith’s. _“I’m so sorry, Keith.”_

 

The sun leaves. The moon arrives. Neither of them leave the beach.

 

Lance stays close by as the years come and go. He stays close to Keith. Because his soulmate needs him. Keith needs him close.

 

He can't hold him. He can’t talk to him. He can’t.

 

But he can protect him. From the world. From himself.

 

From the thoughts that plague him at night. From the shouts that mocks him and tell him he’s unloved and unworthy. For the lack of a body next to him. For the lack of a physical soulmate that died before his time.

 

Lance protects him. As best as he can.

 

He fights back the screams inside Keith’s head with words. Loving and caring. He strokes pale cheeks late at night, when the moonlight outside Keith’s window is barely able to give him a shape of the man he once was.

 

Lance loves him, one day at the time. Because Keith deserves to enjoy his chance of living. Because the fire inside Keith sings to him in ways that soothes his own fire.

 

Sometimes, Lance thinks he did something wrong in his life. That this is his punishment. This bittersweet middle of a story that doesn’t come to an end.

 

Being close to the person he had been meant to love. And can't even hold him.

 

Can’t hold him through his lowest moments. Can’t hold him at his happiest.

 

Death, comes to think of it, is the cruelest joke.

 

Life doesn’t own a dictionary. There’s no ‘fair’ in its vocabulary. But the universe does. The universe gives them both a chance.

 

It’s a small comfort. One that neither of them can hold while being so close and yet worlds apart. But they take it, Keith unknowingly while Lance willingly.

 

The day Keith dies, peacefully and with a heart filled with adventures and love. Lance is there. He is there to catch him.

 

And, _finally_ , he holds him.

**Author's Note:**

> SO! Basically, this came to life to the idea of everyone having a soulmate and if when one of them dies, meeting each other or not, they stay close to their living soulmate. like a guardian angel of the sorts.
> 
> In this au, sadly, Lance died before his time, an unfair turn of events before meeting his soulamte and ends up with Keith, his soulmate before he even knew. And Keith, who searches for his soulmate he never found in life but still had close without him knowing.
> 
> They're okay in the end. Thank you for reading! <3
> 
> Here’s my tumblr, just in case: [bleusarcelle](http://bleusarcelle.tumblr.com)  
> AND my writing tumblr for small drabbles I don't post here: [bleusarcellewrites](http://bleusarcellewrites.tumblr.com)


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